Well, where to begin? Tess, Dave and I started the day at home. She was fascinated by the crinkling paper, but not totally on board with the whole present process. Still, we had fun hanging out and watching her watch our little, twinkly tree. 🙂

Then we were off to mom and dad’s for utter madness and Christmas on steroids. Wrapping paper flew, little girls squealed and big girls got excited about little boxes. (Dad decided to explain that ‘the best gifts come in the smallest boxes’ to the toddlers, which had me howling from across the room as I doled out kiddie packages.) The little girls were astounded Santa brought them matching presents, and the adults howled when we realized that Brett labeled his kids’ presents “from God”. Tess slept.

Sometime pre-frenzy, mom and dad got dinner going: turkey and prime rib. Sometime post-frenzy, a frazzled parent tried to make pizza for the kids and preheated the oven dad was cooking prime rib in. Oops. Prime rib turned into roast beef well done. In a stroke of genius, it was tucked outside to stop cooking. Unfortunately, an unsuspecting family member didn’t know this and sent the dogs out. Lets just say they had Christmas dinner, too. Yikes! It’s a testament to mom’s must-be-Italian mass quantities of food that we didn’t even notice!

Dave got sick and missed dinner. Tess fell asleep before 7. Santa came in person while the kids were napping and had to circle back after dinner. We almost forgot to put out the mashed potatoes, spilled wax all over the table, broke an angel (mom did it!), and pretty much had the best time ever. I love how remarkable our holidays are. 🙂

Lots of laughter, the ubiquitous magic coffee, aunt Sue’s famous cake roll, delicious food and even better conversation…no one can top our Christmas! Tess and I didn’t leave until after midnight, and went home happy as can be.

We followed up yesterday’s 30-person feast with homemade turkey soup for sicko Dave and a ginger snap for Tess – her first cookie! With those two little teeth, she seemed quite intrigued by the act of biting into something, and I was happy that it turned into mush pretty fast – no sharp edges.

Tess is sleeping like crazy, catching up on a the rest she missed the last few days. We’re missing yet another say of cousin fun, but Tess is hopefully still healthy so it’s worth it. Dave and I are enjoying her nap time by watching a hideously bad Bob Hope and Bing Crosby movie. Life is grand.